


Capsize

by rednihilist



Category: Halt and Catch Fire
Genre: Character Study, Dissociation, Gen, Self-Hatred
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-01
Updated: 2017-02-01
Packaged: 2018-09-21 10:52:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,658
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9545222
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rednihilist/pseuds/rednihilist
Summary: No one is entirely themselves anywhere, not even inside their own head. Joe just has more to hide, more to change, more clothing in his closet.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: 'Halt & Catch Fire' and certain characters belong to AMC Studios. No profit is gained from this writing—only, hopefully, enjoyment.

When he's four, when he's six, when he turns seven, he's Joey, and Joey felt things strongly, immediately, effortlessly, like most children. Joey smiled for people, smiled to get his mom to smile, to make his dad proud of him. And Joey laughed, laughed all the time, laughing when someone said a word he thought was funny, laughing forever whenever he was tickled and once almost peeing his pants in front of company, at that big old house the three of them had lived in, his dad's coworkers and his mom's friends over for a nighttime party, and Joey was just down to say goodnight. His dad picked him up and tickled him all down his sides and under his arms, and they all laughed. His dad laughed so hard he cried, hugged Joey close, and all the adults shared embarrassing stories. His dad cried when he laughed really hard, but Joey's mom cried all the time. And Joey cried, too. He cried when animals died, cried with his mom sometimes when she cried over silly things and wouldn't stop, crying when she wouldn't get out of bed, when she yelled at people who weren't there, when she sat staring at him but her eyes couldn't find him, crying when she wasn't there to pick him up after school and his dad was, his dad saying she'd had to go away for awhile. Joey cried because he was upset and sad or sometimes because he was so happy he couldn't get the feelings out in the right order. Joey was pretty normal for a kid. He had a weird mom and a dad who wasn't around a whole lot, but Joey was OK.

In the hospital, everyone calls him Joey, everyone but his dad. He's the first one to call him Joe.

Charles, when they're up in his bedroom once after school, fooling around and laughing because they have the whole place to themselves for another few hours, asks him, "Were you ever a 'Joey'?"

Rebecca, when they're with her family, says, "Joey here isn't a big fan of the Mets," and they all laugh, and he keeps the smile on his face by sheer willpower. He's good at faking it by then.

And Simon, grabbing him by the face and grinning, pinning him with his hips to the counter, once jokingly says, "Aw, Joey, lighten up!"

There isn't a word for what Joe feels when someone is digging and picking at him, when he's being looked at and the look is attempting to peel back layers of his history for no discernible purpose beyond gross curiosity. He knows immediately what that look means. Across the board, people give to others only what they're willing to divulge, tell coworkers, friends, and lovers just what they're comfortable having them know, and yet Joe is consistently criticized, teased, and mocked, to his face, about lying and hiding and being cold, aloof.

Rules that apply to others do not apply to him. That has always been true. When he realized that not everyone feels the way he does—that other boys, other men, don't see a handsome, charming man and want him, don't see a beautiful, charming woman and want her, don't see someone gorgeous and charming in women's clothing with breasts and lipstick and a dick and want them, someone slim-hipped and rough with an angular face, someone who looks back at him with fire in their eyes, all for him—Joe knew he was already at a disadvantage, that life would be harder for him than for those other people. And Joe's not stupid. People don't like weirdos, so Joe hides all the things that make him weird. He hides when he's with his dad, hides with the other boys at school, the girls he dates, the few boys he messes around with, the other men at college, the women he dates, the men he goes home with, his bosses, his coworkers. No one is entirely themselves anywhere, not even inside their own head. Joe just has more to hide, more to change, more clothing in his closet.

Joey loved his mom, but Joe doesn't have one. He's not crazy; he's not a different person than he was before; he's just not the same either. And his mom left after he fell, left and then died, and once he started introducing himself as Joe, once he became more man than boy, he had to hide other things to be normal, had to shift into acting, lying, hiding more than he ever, ever, ever told anyone. He maybe became someone else. Or maybe he was forced to, squeezed into a box he would never fit, boxes he couldn't check, benchmarks he never met, standards he couldn't ever understand let alone hit.

And everyone else lies, hides, cheats. How is Joe always different even when he's exactly the same? How is he supposed to be the same when he's always somehow different?

People stare and laugh and tease and try to pick him apart inch by inch, and he returns fire, always wondering why he has to be on the defensive, why he's never good enough, why everything, every single aspect of his entire life is shit.

But nothing ventured, nothing gained, or so they say. If he's going to burn, he'd rather strike the match, rather take them all with him. And when it comes right down to it, the edge, the precipice is the only place he actually feels anything outside anger, fear, self-loathing. "Adrenaline junkie," he's heard said, but it's not the rush he's after. It's success.

"When I was a boy," he'll say and mean it, mean every word in that moment to those people.

Or, "How many of you?" he'll ask, and in that instant he's more aligned with them than he's ever been with anyone.

He'll say, "I don't know about you, but I certainly. . . " and he'll smile a genuine smile and almost, almost, almost feel it deep inside, grazing that happiness, that thrill with the tip of his finger, chasing it forever.

He's Joe; he's Joe MacMillan. And he's hollow and empty, but he's the vessel for everything nobody has room for anymore, what everyone throws to the wayside or denies, all the nasty stuff they pretend they don't think but all the great things they don't allow themselves to wonder at too. Patron, visionary, Joe is fuel, inspiration. He makes paths, opens doors. And maybe he's invisible the way a window is once someone's looking through it, or forgettable the way all the hurdles and obstacles, all the pain and suffering diminish once the impossible is achieved. Maybe he's useless the way the past is, when it's dead and gone and never coming back.

Joe can feel anything at anytime with anyone, and so maybe he's a mirror, but mirrors are more than reflective surfaces, more than what they show. He's lighter than air, essential, soaring 100 miles above everyone else, running 100 miles faster, without rest, without breaking, outthinking, outplaying, outpacing everyone in the game. He can do anything for anyone; he can change the world. He's real.

He doesn't slip. He falls; he's pushed. He tries and fails and tries and falls and tries tries tries tries tries until he's just standing there under cold water, naked, everyone laughing, everyone glaring in disgust, and all his sacrifice, all his pain, all of his ideas, hard work and _need_ —are gone, slid down the drain. It's always shittier on the other side, never success, never winning. Joe's never fucking won a goddamn thing in his life. What's his contribution? Connection? No, disappointment, renewed and repackaged, tired rip-offs of someone else's half-assed junk. His modern marvels are tossed in the garbage.

Maybe he never tries quite hard enough, doesn't want it enough, loses sight of the endgame, trips into trivial matters, entanglements. A person can't be great if they're in a herd, and nothing counts if no one knows he did it.

Straw man, tin man, hollow, sociopath, narcissist, psycho, asshole, jerk, who are you, what's wrong with you, I don't even know you,  sure you'll do better for yourself next time, you never change, you're disgusting, you lose.

If he's great, then it will be worth it. If he does it, if he does it, if he's the one who does it, then everything else is wiped away. The trash gets taken out for guests. And he can start fresh.

Nobody likes what's underneath, the tiny peeks he allows. No one ever loves what he hides, so why would he ever expose it? So they can fully appreciate how disgusting and worthless he truly is? So they can attack harder, push him away farther? He can be someone people will like, someone they'll think they love, and that– that's almost better than the real thing. It's certainly more realistic.

He stands it, abides it. Joe survives. He scrapes by. That's what he's best at. Everyone around him dropping, looking at him and wondering why he's still here, why he isn't sick, why he isn't hurt, and he still needs something, something, but Joe's finally figuring out that all his hiding is the trap he keeps falling into, slowly realizing his whole world is quicksand and every struggle to escape and climb free is steadily dragging him further down.

He wants to be clean, pure, easygoing, authentic, so he keeps everything sectioned off, partitioned off, neat, put away. He is what he is, and he is what he appears to be. He projects the image he wants others to see. It's easy, simple, basic. People like categories, labels, binaries, black and white, and Joe can be the good guy. And he can be their villain too. What's true is what's there, visible, what someone can reach out and touch. If they can't see it, then they don't know it.

He depends on that.


End file.
